


Dental plan

by Veto_power_over_clocks



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Transformers (IDW Generation One)
Genre: Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 (Movie) Spoilers, Canon-Typical Violence, Crossover, Gen, Humor, Post-Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 (Movie), Post-Transformers: Lost Light 25, There's a Gamora cameo here, This was a request but it also wasn't
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-04
Updated: 2019-08-04
Packaged: 2020-07-30 14:31:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,675
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20098738
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Veto_power_over_clocks/pseuds/Veto_power_over_clocks
Summary: It's the Scavengers against Thanos.No points for guessing who wins.





	Dental plan

**Author's Note:**

  * For [darkwizart](https://archiveofourown.org/users/darkwizart/gifts).

> Hawke asked for "the Scavengers defeating Thanos", so I delivered. I hope you enjoy it!

The ship's flying wrongly. Wrong direction. Wrong course. Wrong way. It’s wrong.

Wrong. Funny word. Say it a bunch of times and your vocalizer wants to give up, like it’s tangled in the word. Wrong. Wro-o-o-o-ong.

What's wrong is the fact that the Lost Light is falling instead of flying.

Someone's yelling.

They keep falling.

Spinister grabs hold of his recharge slab and hums as they fall.

He stops humming when they crash. It’s hard to hum when you’re unconscious.

* * *

“Spinister? Spin?” Misfire’s saying, shaking Spinister by the shoulder. “Get up, buddy, you can’t die on me too.”

He onlines his optics. Above him there’s his recharge slab and the desk. He turns his head and sees that everything he owns is on the floor. The ceiling. He’s lying on the ceiling.

He looks at his other side and finds Misfire kneeling next to him. Crankcase, Fulcrum and Krok are behind him.

Standing at the door there’s a figure in a dark cloak who doesn’t seem to mind having Grimlock pointing his sword at them, nor the unimpressed, angry look Nickel's giving them.

“None Of You Is Dying Today,” the figure says. Spinister doesn’t hear their voice as much as he feels the words taking shape inside his processor.

“You said you’d talk when we were all together,” Nickel says, pointing an accusatory finger at the figure. “This is it. There’s no one else.”

“Where are they?” Grimlock changes his stance, ready to attack.

“Your Friends Are Elsewhere, Beyond Your Reach, For Their Lives Have Come To Their Ends,” the figure says, lowering their hood to reveal a white eye-less head. There’s no plating, or skin, or anything to cover the structure. Spinister is _ sure _ that he has seen this shape elsewhere.

“Aren’t you too big for a skeleton?” Misfire asks.

Right! A human skull! That’s what the shape is!

“Guys, they just said that everyone is dead,” Fulcrum says, looking around in horror.

“Try again,” Grimlock says, bringing his sword to the skeleton's neck.

The skeleton tilts their head.

“A Great Power Was Just Unleashed Upon The Universe. It Killed Half Of All Life. Your Friends Were Some Of The Unlucky Ones.”

“You know, you need to be a lot clearer than that or Grimsy here is gonna chop you into little pieces,” Misfire says, making a face.

The skeleton sighs and runs a hand down their face.

“Okay, Guys, Here’s The Thing,” they say, making an ambiguous gesture with their hand. “Some Purple Jerk Got A Ton Of Magic Power And Killed Half The Universe. Randomly. I Have Bajillions Of Souls Crossing Over And I’m On The Verge Of A Mental Breakdown.” Their hands are shaking and their ‘voice’ had gone more and more high pitched as they talked. “i need help and you’re my best option.”

“Uh, who are you, exactly?”

“…seriously?” Spinister thinks the skeleton might be gaping. “Big Skeleton in a Black Robe doesn’t give you Any Ideas?”

“We’re mechanoids,” Nickel points out, unimpressed.

“Right. You Are.” Another sigh. “I’m Death.”

“Sure.”

The skeleton grows bigger. Shadows stretch from their cloak to cover the room. It gets colder.

“**_You Dare Doubt One Of The Greatest Forces In The Universe_**,” the skeleton booms. “**_I Am-_ ** Shit. Fuck. No.” The skeleton returns to its previous size, the shadows retreat and the room gets warm again. “That’s not who I’m supposed to be here. Ugh.” They massage their temples with their fingertips and sigh. “Let’s Start Again.”

The skeleton ignores Grimlock’s still menacing stance and sits down on the floor/ceiling, their knees drawn to their chest. “I’m Death. The Only Death. i exist across all universes. i’m not the same in every universe aND sOMETIMES i gET cONFUSED. lIKE nOW. i’M rEALLY sORRY aBOUT tHAT.” They drop their head to their knees. “LiKe I sAiD, hAlF tHe UnIvErsE jUsT dIeD, aNd It’S gIvInG mE a LoT oF eXtRa WoRk. I Don’t Feel So Good Right Now.”

What follows is a monologue in which ‘Death’ tells them about a guy called Thanos who got himself some magic pebbles because he thought resources were being used poorly.

“…what an idiot,” Nickel says after ‘Death’ is done talking.

“I KnoW, RighT?” ‘Death’ says, looking up at Nickel and moving a hand for emphasis. “That'S WhY I NeeD YouR HelP.”

“Why us?” Krok asks.

“I’vE EncountereD YoU IN OtheR UniverseS. You’rE GooD AT DesperatE SituationS.” ‘Death’ stands up on shaky legs and, hugging themself, says, “i need you to get the infinity stones from him.”

They all exchange looks.

“Emergency huddle,” Krok says.

“Do we believe them?” Fulcrum asks.

“No,” Grimlock says.

“Definitely no,” Crankcase emphasizes.

“Sure, why not?” Spinister says, earning dubious looks from everyone. He shrugs. “If they’re really Death, they could just kill us. Why go through all this trouble?”

“Good question,” Krok mutters. “Death?” he calls. “Why aren’t _ you _ fixing this?”

“I’m NOt SupPosed To InteRfere.” They sound very whiny and very annoyed and very tired. It must be the nervous breakdown.

“And how do we know you’re not planning to kill everyone after we get the stones?”

‘Death’ huffs.

“What’s the point of that? I depend on people ** _Dying_**, not on them ** _Being_ ** dead. I need people to ** _Exist_**, to ** _Live_ ** and ** _Reproduce_**, and to come up with ** _Exquisitely Complicated Ways_ ** of killing each other.”

Nickel makes a face.

“That’s not ominous at all,” Misfire deadpans.

“will YOU do IT or NOT?!” ‘Death’ screeches, then curls up on the ground again. “Sorry. Sorry. I’m not Myself Right Now. I Don’t Know Who I Am Right Now. THis Is MESsing WIth Me.”

“We don’t have much to lose, do we?” Fulcrum says.

“And it’s not like we can win.” Crankcase sighs.

“No. I don’t think so,” Krok says, resigned.

* * *

‘Death’ is nice enough to give them the coordinates to where the Purple Menace is apparently happily living his retirement before vanishing, and they all spend the whole ride there trying to come up with a plan.

Nickel doesn’t like the plan. Neither does Grimlock. Or Krok. Or Crankcase. At least Fulcrum seems willing to go along with it. How exactly had this plan been approved?

What matters is that it’s happening and one of them will have to steal the Pebbles while the others act as bait. Spinister loses. Or wins? Losins? Woses? He draws the short straw, figuratively speaking.

It could be worse. He could be everyone else.

They land in front of Purple’s hut and wait.

Purple is the most unimpressive thing Spinister has seen, and he’s someone that’s seen Grimlock’s attempts at flirting.

He’s uglier than Spinister expected, and he’d been expecting the ugliest.

He’s too dumb to notice Spinister’s holomatter avatar latching to his leg when he leaves his hut to look threateningly at the assorted aliens descending from the ship, although that might be because Spinister is currently the size of one of Purple Menace’s fingernails.

“Greetings, fellow destroyer!”Misfire says, practically skipping down the ramp despite how his voice shakes. His holoform looks like a Saisian: same height as his actual frame, dark blue scales, a tail, and long arms that must be kept crossed in front of the chest so as to avoid dragging them on the ground.

Purple Menace raises one of his hands. There's a gauntlet on it, with the Pebbles attached.

“If you think you can stop me-”

“Stop you!?” Fulcrum screeches, his Osiarapan avatar showing his terror better than his own frame could, what with the six wings raising in alarm, the four arms wrapping defensively around his torso and the three mouths on the otherwise featureless face curling downwards. “We’re not here to stop you!” He drops to his knees, lowers his head and raises two hands pleadingly as he says, “Don't kill us.”

The Purple Menace looks unimpressed. Itsy-Bitsy Spinister makes it all the way to his waist.

“What my colleague here should be saying,” Nickel says, grabbing one of Fulcrum’s wings and pulling him to his feet. She hadn't bothered with an avatar, “is that we're here for your review, but we don't want you killing us.”

“My review,” Purple says flatly. Itsy-Bitsy Spinister reaches his shoulder.

“Listen, you’re the one with the power here,” Krok says, conciliatory, the massive head of his Trespic avatar bobbing with the effort needed to keep it upright, his short arms outstretched in the best friendly gesture that that appearance allows. “We will stay right here and talk, and if you decide you don't care for what we have to say, we'll get back on our ship and leave.”

“Not even my review was this difficult,” Grimlock huffs, crossing his arms in front of his chest. He picked a human holoform, because being a dinobot messes with your sense of style.

“Yes, it was,” Nickel chastises him.

“Mine wasn't!” Misfire says, tail moving from side to side.

“You offered us refreshments. I remember,” Krok says, trying to nod solemnly and falling back because of his head’s weight. Spinister had _ told _him that he should disable the more realistic parts of the avatar, but Misfire had insisted on how the realism would make the whole act more believable and realistic.

Realism is a bad word. He shouldn't have used it so much.

Purple lowers his arm as the others do their best to get Krok upright.

“Good! You're not threatening us anymore!” Misfire says.

“What do you want?” Purple says, still sounding very threatening.

Nickel resets her vocalizer and turns towards the ramp. Light shines from inside the ship, framing the figure that descends from it. The fangs, the wings and the golden skin would be more impressive if Spinister didn't know it's Crankcase underneath them.

“Hello,” he says, sounding proper and dignified and not at all like a grump. “I assume you are Thanos of Titan?” There's no reply. Itsy-Bitsy Spinister reaches Purple’s elbow. “We are from the Multiversal Doomsday Council, here to invite you to our organization and to offer some pointers on how to improve your performance.”

Purple doesn't look happy.

“The what?”

Itsy-Bitsy Spinister reaches the first Pebble and latches onto it.

For a moment, he's everyone.

For a moment, Spinister isn't itsy-bitsy anymore. He's not Spinister anymore, he's Purple and he's Nickel and he's Misfire and he's Crankcase and he's Grimlock and he's Krok and he's Fulcrum and he's Death.

_ He's Death. _

Death is there as well.

Death hadn't stayed behind.

The Pebble comes loose and falls to the ground, and he's Itsy-Bitsy Spinister again.

Five Pebbles left.

"We are a select group," Misfire says with a flourish. "We come from different worlds. Different _ realities_. All of us made our way through the universe and killed so many people that our names have become curses!"

"I'm the messenger, remember?" Crankcase snaps.

Misfire turns around, looking insulted and ready to argue, but then Itsy-Bitsy Spinister reaches the green Pebble and everything stops.

He looks around. He looks up. Purple remains unimpressed. He's even uglier from this distance. He has the power to alter reality and instead of giving himself a makeover he uses it to kill half of everyone? Those are some really messed up priorities.

The Pebble comes loose and falls to the ground, and everything moves again.

Nickel raises a finger and points it at Misfire.

"We have a script for this. Stick to it," she says threateningly.

Misfire nods and takes a step back, raising his hands protectively.

Crankcase, still sounding like he wants to be Ultra Magnus, continues. "As my colleague was saying, each of us was the scourge of their respective universe. We brought death and destruction. We made _ reality itself _ fear us." He glances at Fulcrum and mutters, "Except him. He just got lucky." With a normal tone he adds, "But the rest of us are certified destroyers."

Itsy-Bitsy Spinister reaches the blue Pebble.

He's elsewhere. He's everywhere. His body stretches across the planet, across the galaxy, across the universe, until he brushes the edge of the next one.

The Pebble comes loose and falls to the ground, and Spinister is confined to his itsy-bitsy avatar again.

"We have all found each other because we wanted the _ right _ company. We wanted people who understood what we'd done, so we search for kindred spirits across realities,” Crankcase says solemnly. He seems to be having fun with the role. “What you did here, Thanos of Titan, was impressive."

"I am not like you," Purple says, very obviously angry. His voice raises as he continues, "You talk about yourselves like the end of life is enjoyable, like killing people was some amusement you decided to partake in. I am not like you. I made a sacrifice so that this universe could thrive!" That was some impressive yelling. Spinister saw drops of saliva flying to the ground. So he isn’t just ugly, he’s also gross.

Grimlock snorts and says, "You killed people. All of us had our own noble reasons for it, but in the end, dead people are dead people"

Itsy-Bitsy Spinister reaches the orange Pebble.

Nothing happens. He is himself. He stays himself. He couldn't be anyone else.

The Pebble comes loose and falls to the ground, and Itsy-Bitsy Spinister remains himself.

"It's a burden I chose to carry," Purple says, starting to raise the arm with Itsy-Bitsy Spinister on it.

"And it's very noble that you did!" Fulcrum says, taking a step forwards and moving his wings, drawing Purple's attention to them. "But we're also here for your performance review!"

"What are you talking about?" Purple somehow manages to sound even unhappier. Like his ugly face somehow hadn't given him all the unhappiness he could hope for in his life.

"We like you, Thanos of Titan," Crankcase says, sounding conciliatory and sympathetic and not at all like a huge liar, because Purple Menace is a jerk and all of them agreed that the universe would be better off without him, "but we try to keep select company."

"We looked over your plan, you see?" Krok says, his arms outstretched to the sides to help him keep the balance. "And we found some flaws in it."

Several, actually. It was a very dumb plan. All of them could see that it was a very dumb plan. If you go around landing on planets and killing people, somebody's bound to notice, and whenever somebody notices things you get people trying to stop you. Like Spinister’s plan to redecorate the medibay.

It would have looked amazing.

Itsy-Bitsy Spinister reaches the red Pebble.

There are linchpins all around him, holding existence in place. He could try to see what happens when he moves one.

"I wouldn't do that if I were you," a stern voice says.

Itsy-Bitsy Spinister freezes mid-motion and turns his head, finding a green person standing next to him. He isn't on the gauntlet anymore; they're in a lake. His feet are wet.

"How did you get here?" the person asks him, eyes narrowing.

"I grabbed the red Pebble," he says. "Where are we?"

"In the fabric of reality," the person says, kneeling to submerge their hands.

"Looks boring. What do you do here?" Spinister asks, copying them. It isn't cold. He looks at his distorted hands in the water.

"I watch things happen and wait." They sound tired.

"Sounds boring too." He splashes and watches the ripples.

"It is."

"Can we leave?" he asks, lowering himself to lie on his back.

"I can't," they say regretfully.

Spinister is about to reply, but the Pebble comes loose and falls to the ground, and he's back on the gauntlet.

"The part of your plan that we _ really _ don't understand," Fulcrum says, all three mouths grimacing, "is the one about killing half of _ all life _ so there are enough resources for everyone. We took a detour through some planets and found a lot of people starving because there aren't enough animals and plants."

"You left things just as bad as they were before," Misfire says, nodding quickly.

"But you also doomed some species to extinction," Krok says. "Which is enough for us to offer you a spot in our association."

"This offer has benefits," Crankcase says, still doing the Ultra Magnus impression, "including paid vacations and a dental plan."

"And the chance to hang out with us!" Misfire says, pointing at himself and grinning.

Itsy-Bitsy Spinister reaches the purple Pebble.

Many things happen.

First, there's _ light_.

Then there's Purple noticing him and making a sound that's a bit like a battle cry, a lot like a tantrum.

The avatars disappear and Grimlock is running towards Purple, sword in hand, and Itsy-Bitsy Spinister lets himself fall to the ground before Purple gets to try to smack him away.

He reaches for the green Pebble and everything stops again.

Maybe he should have done that from the start.

He sits up on the ground with the Pebble in his lap and looks around. Grimlock is almost on them and he looks like he has the battle handled. Poor Purple. He’s going to be killed so undramatically.

Spinister walks out of the ship, picks up Itsy-Bitsy Spinister and the Pebble, and then Itsy-Bitsy Spinister is no more and there's only Spinister.

"Wow," he says, twirling the pebble between his fingers. He tries to crush it between his palms, but it doesn’t work.

He walks over, takes out Purple's gauntlet, and puts the Pebbles on it again, then he throws Purple to the ground and kicks him in the head for good measure.

Grimsy can handle the rest.

Spinister goes back to the ship and gets everything in motion again.

"Gross," Fulcrum mutters as Grimlock decapitates Purple.

“Effective,” Grimlock says, kneeling to wipe his sword on Purple’s clothes.

"What now?" Nickel asks, crossing her arms and eyeing the gauntlet.

"Now, one Of you Has to Undo what He did," 'Death' says, stepping into reality and making everyone jump.

"And then?" Grimlock says, pointing his sword at 'Death' and acting like he hadn’t also jumped.

"_T_hen _I_'ll _b_e **T****_aking_** _t_hat. _W_e _s_houldn't _h_ave _l_et _t_hese **T****_rinkets_** _o_ut _o_f _o_ur _s_ight."

"We?" Nickel says, looking around.

"Yo**u** thi**n**k **I**'m th**e** on**l**y grea**t**er p**o**wer i**n** t**h**e multive**r**se?"

They all look at each other and don't say anything.

"What if we don't give it to you?" Crankcase asks.

'Death' shrugs.

"As LoNg As ThInGs ArE pUt In OrDeR aGaIn, I don't care."

"Really?"

'Death' laughs. It travels through every circuit in Spinister's frame and it feels like seeing a spark shrinking, a wound leaking, scraplets latching onto a limb. It feels like every battle he has ever lost.

"i am endless. i am everywhere. i will be HERE LONg after You're gONe. notHING yoU do actuALLY matTERS. KEep thE GAUntleT IF You waNT, BUt put EVERythiNG IN placE FIRst," they say, sounding amused.

"Emergency huddle," Krok says.

"Any ideas?" Crankcase asks.

"We have the power to do anything, right?" Nickel says. "We can keep them from taking the gauntlet and then set some things right first. Maybe we can make it so we won the war."

"You're still stuck on that?" Fulcrum whispers, horrified and amazed.

"Not Possible," 'Death' says from where they're still standing, right next to Purple's corpse. "**_The Gems' Power Is Limited To The Universe They Come From, And I’m Everywhere._**"

“You’re not supposed to eavesdrop!” Misfire chastises.

‘Death’ tilts their head and looks very unimpressed.

"So we can change anything that happened here, but nothing from the universe we came from?" Grimlock asks.

'Death' nods.

They all look at each other.

"You could get your head fixed," Misfire tells Crankcase.

"Maybe they can make you a good shot," Spinister tells Misfire.

"Or give Fulcrum a useful alt-mode," Misfire adds.

"Give Nickel a better personality?" Spinister suggests.

“Make you into a coherent person,” Nickel says. “And teach Grimlock how to flirt."

"Build Krok's clinic?" Fulcrum says before Grimlock can retaliate.

"Enough!" Krok says. "Let's do what we were asked to do and give it back."

"Oh, come on!" Misfire whines.

"It's too much power. If we start changing small things, we'll never stop," Krok says gravelly.

Everyone looks at everyone. Spinister is looking at ‘Death’, who is cooing at some plants.

"...Crankcase's head was a reasonable request," Nickel finally says.

"We can do that one."

They all step back to look at 'Death' again.

"Do we get a reward for this?" Krok asks, crossing his arms in front of his chest and trying to look like an authority.

'Death' tilts their head and hums.

"I **guess** I **can** promise **not** to **take** you **until** your **respective** sparks **have** exhausted **themselves**?"

"That's not much, is it?" Misfire says, unimpressed.

"it'S Who i aM In this UnIvErse. You're getting more than I have ever offered anyone else."

"I hate this," Crankcase mutters.

"We're not winning this one either," Fulcrum sighs. "We never win anything."

"We beat the guy," Spinister says, gesturing with the gauntlet towards the body on the ground.

"You just saved half the universe," 'Death' says softly. "I'd say you can win sometimes."

There's some more sighing before they start trying to decide who gets to fix things. There's a lot of arguing involved too. In the end, they give Grimlock the gauntlet and he brings everyone back.

He fixes Crankcase's head too.

He also collapses to the ground, systems failing because that much power shouldn't be held by a mortal and it might have been a tad too much for his frame.

In the ensuing chaos of keeping Grimlock from dying, Spinister catches sight of 'Death' picking up the gauntlet. They must notice him staring, because they turn to him and wave before stepping out of reality.

He thinks it was meant as a 'See you later.'

See you later.

_ See _ you later.

See _ you _ later.

See you _ later._

That doesn’t mean anything either if you say it too much.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! Kudos and comments make my day.
> 
> If you want to promote this fic, you can reblog [this post](https://veto-power-over-fanworks.tumblr.com/post/186766593495/dental-plan)


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